Brittany Haynes

The 2024 recipient of the Katie Fields Bell Fellow Award is Brittany Haynes, Social Studies teacher at Loftis Middle School. Brittany created a lesson for 5th graders centered on the Trail of Tears and wove into her lesson the stories of all five Medal of Honor Recipients from the Cherokee Nation.

Through her lesson, students will explore the impact President Andrew Jackson had on America and the Cherokee Nation in the early 1800s. Students will analyze and gather information from a variety of sources to distinguish between the differing points of view of President Jackson & the US Government and the Cherokee Nation. Students then move forward in time to analyze the lives and sacrifices made by five Cherokee Medal of Honor Recipients and consider why those Cherokee men chose to join in fighting for the same country that had turned against their ancestors. The lesson, which will soon be available on our website, also encourages students to consider the character values exhibited by the Medal of Honor Recipients included within the lesson.

The Katie Fields Bell Fellow Award is not just an award; it is a call to action. It shall serve as a reminder to all who are awarded to live a life relentlessly pursuing ways to better the lives of the students who pass through their classroom each year by teaching them what it means to be committed to a goal, that sometimes sacrifices must be made, the importance of integrity, that they play a significant role as a citizen, what it means to love their country by working to make it better, and how to be courageous in trying moments through life.